to Andrew Lang

Union Club, Sydney [August 1890].

MY DEAR LANG,—I observed with a great deal of surprise and interest that a controversy in which you have been taking sides at home, in yellow London, hinges in part at least on the Gilbert Islanders and their customs in burial.  Nearly six months of my life has been passed in the group: I have revisited it but the other day; and I make haste to tell you what I know.  The upright stones—I enclose you a photograph of one on Apemama—are certainly connected with religion; I do not think they are adored.  They stand usually on the windward shore of the islands, that is to say, apart from habitation (on enclosed islands, where the people live on the sea side, I do not know how it is, never having lived on one).  I gathered from Tembinoka, Rex Apemamae, that the pillars were supposed to fortify the island from invasion: spiritual martellos.  I think he indicated they were connected with the cult of Tenti—pronounce almost as chintz in English, the t being explosive; but you must take this with a grain of salt, for I knew no word of Gilbert Island; and the King’s English, although creditable, is rather vigorous than exact.  Now, here follows the point of interest to you: such pillars, or standing stones, have no connection with graves.  The most elaborate grave that I have ever seen in the group—to be certain—is in the form of a raised border of gravel, usually strewn with broken glass.  One, of which I cannot be sure that it was a grave, for I was told by one that it was, and by another that it was not—consisted of a mound about breast high in an excavated taro swamp, on the top of which was a child’s house, or rather maniapa—that is to say, shed, or open house, such as is used in the group for social or political gatherings—so small that only a child could creep under its eaves.  I have heard of another great tomb on Apemama, which I did not see; but here again, by all accounts, no sign of a standing stone.  My report would be—no connection between standing stones and sepulture.  I shall, however, send on the terms of the problem to a highly intelligent resident trader, who knows more than perhaps any one living, white or native, of the Gilbert group; and you shall have the result.  In Samoa, whither I return for good, I shall myself make inquiries; up to now, I have neither seen nor heard of any standing stones in that group.—Yours,

R. L. Stevenson.